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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28431363">Connections, Connections</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/CookieCatSU/pseuds/CookieCatSU'>CookieCatSU</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Rizzoli &amp; Isles</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>F/F, Fluff and Angst, Maura-centric, Platonic Soulmates, Romantic Soulmates, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Soulmates AU, this is a character study</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-12-30</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-01-08</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-10 20:00:53</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>3</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>3,888</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28431363</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/CookieCatSU/pseuds/CookieCatSU</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Soulmarks denote important connections. Maura had always struggled with the concept. </p><p>And then she met the Rizzolis.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Constance Isles &amp; Maura Isles, Maura Isles &amp; Angela Rizzoli, Maura Isles &amp; Vince Korsak, Maura Isles/Jane Rizzoli, Other Relationship Tags to Be Added</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>6</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>59</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. I Belong In Your Orbit</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>I am a sucker for Maura/Jane. I also think the show presents a myriad of platonic relationships for Maura that are really important and worth exploring, so that's the main point of this work. </p><p>There will be plenty of Maura/Jane, but that's not the main focus until the last chapter or so.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p>There were never any illusions.</p><p>Maura has a swan on her wrist, small and blazing blue, burning bright in Phoenix flame. It's tiny eyes are piercing, and Maura can often feel it's gaze searing through her in judgement.</p><p>Her skin is often hot with it, with that sharp judgement. It's the same as Constance's eyes, when Maura becomes too antsy to be able to stand obediently silent at her side. When her black shoed, white socked foot starts to tap, and she itches to speak.</p><p>Her mother doesn't have one. Instead there is a heart on her ring finger, etched in passionate bloody red, dripping down the silhouette, refusing to be boxed nor contained. Arthur matches her, as he always does, with a flurry of sharp lines and beading red ink.</p><p>Maura purses her quivering lips, presses her arms tight to her sides, and does her best to follow her mother's instructions. And somewhere, deep down within, she hopes. </p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>Arthur and Constance never have time for Maura. They are too trapped up in each other. Their shared marks are a premonition, a sign, a long since written prediction.</p><p>They are each other's. Maura is theirs, surely, but never in that single-minded way that every child craves, somewhere deep in the murky depths of their core. The Isles are the center of Maura's world, but she is in no shape or form the axis they revolve around. She is not their center.</p><p>She is often an afterthought, a trinket, an accessory. She is loved, but never fully, never when it is inconvenient.</p><p>"Come along, Maura" Constance calls, sharp and with little fanfare. Her gate is brisk and her hand is cold, and Maura struggles to keep up.</p><p>She is amazed by the duality of it all. How she can be so close, and also so impossibly separate. Part of the family but never part of their galaxy, never quite welcomed fully into their orbit.</p><p>Constance Isles is a streaking, halo of flame, red hot <em> scarlet</em>, but with Maura she is dull, and cold. Gray.</p><p>Maura stares at the gray canvas, and hopes to see even a tiny, gleaming glimpse of blue.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>Maura has always been quiet. Reserved. Such is rewarded, with tasteful smiles and satisfied nods. Her mother shapes her into an obedient young lady, of respect and class, and while she could have done without the slaps on the hand, and the veiled glares, she thanks her for it. For the lessons, on the distinction between salad forks and dessert spoons, the fencing classes and French dictionaries.</p><p>She inadvertently teaches her to be an excellent listener. Never to speak, always with ears open, mind clear.</p><p>Her father comes to her with desperate eyes, shaking hands, heavy heart. His mark pulsates, fit both to implode and burst apart at any moment.</p><p>He confides in her, because he knows she will not tell. He knows the power he holds. He sees the swan, tiny, but glowing like a beacon.</p><p>His hand is heavy on Maura's shoulder, and her feet dangle high off the floor, her elbows perpendicular with her forearms on the table. Soon, she is desperate for the landline.</p><p>"You must not tell anyone. Okay?"</p><p>Maura promises. Maura promises, and hopes. Her throat is tight, and her eyes are wet and wide.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>That lie tied her tongue in knots, left it heavy and leaden. The only remedy was the truth.</p><p>So the truth she'd tell.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>"My parents don't exactly do warm, Jane. They were always very… pragmatic, and practical"</p><p>"That sounds more like detached and icy" Jane sighs faintly, something akin to sympathy coating her tone, "wasn't your Fencing coach like your babysitter or something"</p><p>Maura laughs. It's the slightest bit strained, threads pulled taut.</p><p>"No. Constance and Arthur weren't perfect, but they gave me everything I needed"</p><p>Necessity doesn't touch want, after all.</p><p>What Maura <em>wants</em> has nothing to do with anything.</p><p>Jane gives a skeptical hum, but says nothing else on the topic.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>The first makes her think of ice- it's a skate, with slick curved blades in the sole, and little pink puff balls attached to the laces. The picture is reminiscent of leather, and she can easily imagine the feel of the fabric across her finger tips, as she brushes her fingers over the ink on her shoulder. It's rosy, salmon, and somehow says loved and home, though she can't remember where the mark came from.</p><p>Maura remembers the skate. She remembers an icy lake, hot cocoa, a wooden cabin with rough log walls and shabby rugs across the floors. Phantom sensations.</p><p>She sees an ice pick. A crying woman, and a man needing patching up.</p><p>There is love, unconditional but scattered, and grief, so immense tears spring in Maura eyes sometimes, often without warning. It's so painful, aching and overwhelming, that she's quite glad when the mark grays out, that bright bubblegum pink draining drop by drop.</p><p>Maura's three when the second one appears. There's a woman, kind and patient. Her smile is tiny, her state of dress all sharp lines and razor edges.</p><p>She reaches her hand toward Maura, and the girl quickly takes it, clinging desperately to that anchor.</p><p>For the first time ever, she isn't alone.</p><p>The blue swan etching itself across her wrist was just par for the course.</p><p> </p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Consider Letting Me In?</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>"You're the perfect daughter" Angela adds, as she fusses over the remaining dishes still needing to be prepped.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p>"We don't talk about it too much, anymore" Angela says, and she covers the greyed out mark with a single finger wrapped around her forearm, and Maura understands. She gets that- that sometimes it's hard to even look at. There's still the lingering scar of a pawprint, after all, stamped between her shoulder blades, just above where she can reach, stuck gouged between powerlessness and frustration. A forever reminder of Ian, whenever she looks in the mirror.</p><p>Drifting away and lost chances.</p><p>She's known Angela two years, nearly as long as she's known Jane. Truly, it feels like an eternity, always and forevermore. She knows that look in her eye, resigned and dispirited, a lost soul floating out at sea.</p><p>The guest house is more than adequate, but seems too cold (too far away, too far from her) at the moment. Maura smiles, warmly affectionate, and does the best she knows how.</p><p>"We could watch a movie? You pick something out, and I'll make popcorn?"</p><p>Maura tosses a buoy her way. Angela grabs it tight with both hands.</p><p>"I'd love that"</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>"You're like the mother I never had" Maura says, so casually it catches them both slightly off guard.</p><p>It flows so easily. It's truer than the textbooks in Maura's office- and just like her pathology textbooks, Maura never lies.</p><p>Angela pauses, tea kettle hanging in her hand mid pour. Then she gently places it on the cafe table, turning her eyes toward the doctor seated primly with wheat toast in hand.</p><p>"Really?"</p><p>"Well, yes. I've never had someone I could just talk to growing up" She pauses, considering something, before a laugh bubbles up her throat, "And who else would I go to gossip with? Or watch soaps with? Constance hates them"</p><p>"She has no taste" Angela replies, without any real acid.</p><p>"Yes" Maura offers a clinical nod, "You also make excellent tea. And your warm" Maura takes a gulp of her tea. "I wonder if that's just part of being a Rizzoli, perhaps? Maybe a warm countenance is a heritable trait"</p><p>"If it's anything like the Rizzoli family temper, it absolutely is"</p><p>Maura smiles over her cup.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>Maura notices the mark a week later. It's blue, like the one meant for Constance, but glows the slightest bit brighter. When she looks at it, she can't stop thinking of charcoal beneath a warm grill, icicle lights, and risotto fresh out the oven, packed in Tupperware.</p><p>"Janie pointed it out to me the other day" Angela says, and her voice is so warm it makes Maura shiver, makes her toes curl with it, waves of cozy firehearth heat. Angela is heat and the intensity of the sun, and sometimes Maura forgets that. </p><p>The elder woman rolls her sweater sleeve upward, and Maura nearly gasps at the collection of marks revealed on her forearm, gently glowing, a plethora of connections.</p><p>She points at the one nearest to her elbow, "I think it's for you"</p><p>When Angela gazes back up at her, her smile is soft and affectionate. Maura blinks slowly, mechanically, and soon realizes her voice is caught thick in her throat.</p><p>Maura steps a little closer, eye caught by that sparkle of cerulean. Eventually, she finds her words, spurred on by Angela's encouraging air.</p><p>"Can I-?" It's taboo, touching another's soulmark without permission. Even the slightest brushing of contact is seen as sullying, tarnishing wreckage; Unless, of course, you are marked with its twin.</p><p>Her hand flutters with motion, but doesn't dare reach closer. Maura holds her breath. </p><p>She does not dare to hope.</p><p>Angela tilts her head, and as if sensing Maura's trepidation, freely offers her arm up to be gazed upon.</p><p>"It's a rolling pin" She says, and with her laugh Maura can see her own insecurities dissipating, somewhat,  engulfed by the solar blaze of the Rizzoli name. </p><p>"You know, I've always wanted to have a doctor in the family"</p><p>Maura grins, and gently touches the symbol. </p><p>It's cool, with a pleasant buzz, and the rolling pin on her right wrist glows brighter in response.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>Hope's expression is bittersweet, beset with grief set anew. She can't tear her eyes away from the mark on her long lost daughter's shoulder, gray as a maelstrom, yet and still.</p><p>"Do you remember?" Hope asks quietly, and she moves as if to poke one of the little, luminescent pink blades, before drawing back, swallowing loud and strangled, "Do you remember when I held you for the first time?"</p><p>Maura looks away. Looking hurts; hurts like metal piercing through her skin.</p><p>"No. Children often don't start retaining memories until the age of three"</p><p>"It was like magic. I held you, cradled your head in my hand- you were so tiny, and I just knew I was supposed to love and care for you, hold you always. I-" Hope swallows again, reaching just above her collarbone. Maura can see a glimpse of pink, a tip of  a boot, ashy pink and dull, striped gray.</p><p>"I still loved you. Even when I thought… even when I thought you were gone. I still love you"</p><p>"I loved you too… an approximation of you. I dreamed of what you'd be like. I dreamed of seeing you again, and having that instant connection" Her fingertips are chilly cold against her shoulder, "It was a fever dream. Entirely unrealistic"</p><p>Hope's stricken sound of surprise hurts, too. Everything seems to ache, at that moment, sending her spiralling. "Maura, I'm sorry"</p><p>Her heart is exposed, laid bare by the rib cage Hope's arrival has torn through like butter.</p><p>The woman shakes her head, slowly rising from her sofa, drifting toward her kitchen counter.</p><p>"It's in the past. There's no need to stress about things that have long since happened" Maura smiles tightly, just as she'd been taught, "Tea?"</p><p>Hope shifts uncomfortably on Maura's sofa, and it's suddenly once again obvious how much she does not belong. "Yes, please".</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>Angela shakes her head. "She wants to bond with you, Maura".</p><p>"Wait, wait. First, she just wanted your kidney. Who knows what she'll ask for next? You need all the rest of your organs, Maur"</p><p>"Jane!"</p><p>"Sorry that I don't approve of somebody using my friend as an organ bank, Ma," Jane huffs, reclining back. "That shouldn't happen until Maura finally donates her body to science. Then they can, you know, perform brain surgeries to figure out the quota of intelligence, or whatever they do, to their hearts' content"</p><p>Maura laughs, light and at once freeing, and the rift that's left her chest shattered like broken glass doesn't hurt nearly so much. "I actually wasn't planning on doing that, but you definitely got me at brain surgery"</p><p>"We can't let that noggin go to waste"</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>Maura is frantic. </p><p>"What are you so worried about?" Angela asks.</p><p>Rejection, perhaps. Though the lack of hors d'oeuvres seems considerably more pressing at the moment.</p><p>"You're the perfect daughter" She adds, as she fusses over the remaining dishes still needing to be prepped.</p><p>Maura feels a warmth deep in her chest, cutting through her panic. </p><p>She imagines it's the warmth of acceptance.</p><p> </p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Then, A Heart To Heart?</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>"Jane likes you, so you're good in my book" Korsak smiles.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p>Korsak has three marks that Maura knows of: one for his ex-wife, one for the son snatched from him, and one for someone he has yet to meet.</p><p>There's something sad, mournful, about the way he regards them.</p><p>"Always had bad luck with these sorts of things" He says, when he catches her eye one Monday afternoon, halfway across the bullpen. </p><p>Maura smiles awkwardly, tearing her eyes from the inky badger on the back of his hand, stamped between thumb and index finger.</p><p>"I'm sorry. It wasn't my intent to pry"</p><p>"No, you're fine" Korsak waves a hand. "It's out there for all to see, anyway"</p><p>Maura doesn't push further, regardless. She doesn't push, because she understands.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>Boston PD's finest are dubious at first, upon Maura Isle's arrival. She's quite certain she's the first female Chief Medical Examiner, and it shows- obvious in wide eyed looks, gasps and uncertain scowls. Queen of the Dead, is murmured quiet and scathing in the hallways, sharp with disdain, disbelief. </p><p>"I've just… never seen someone like you doing something like this" Korsak exclaims, and his eyes mirror the perplexation she's been faced with since she first held up her ID badge, and it said Chief instead of Visitor, head tilted as he watches Maura perform the y-incision. His hands are stuffed in the pockets of his mulch colored suit jacket, and his expression verges on apologetic.</p><p>"I'm not sure I understand what you mean" Maura replies shortly, not because she's frustrated but because completing an autopsy correctly hinges completely on remaining focused.</p><p>"Someone like me refers to which parameters? That I'm a woman? Or my age? Sexuality, perhaps?"</p><p>Detective Korsak shakes his head, rapid and jerky, laughing all the while, as if that suggestion were absurd. "What, no, no. None of that. It's just, seeing someone so put together… slicing and dicing and cutting open dead bodies, it's jarring, you know?"</p><p>She does not, in fact, know.</p><p>Maura glances up finally, blinking slowly. Apologetic has morphed into guilty, ashamed, heel scuffing sheepishness, and it occurs to her that the man may have taken her brisk tone to mean she was offended; which she was not.</p><p>"Of course. I'll take that as a compliment, Detective" Maura informs him, smiling faintly in the hopes of lightening the mood. Surely it would do more good than the dead body laid out on her table. Oh, and what poor manners she was showing, just leaving him there like that.</p><p>"You don't mind if I…?" She's already back at it, scalpel in hand.</p><p>"Go right ahead," Korsak says, and he leaves her to her work.</p><p>That's the difference really.</p><p>He stays, but doesn't engage in small talk and doesn't expect her to either. The work speaks for itself, and Korsak doesn't feel the need to vocalize over it with empty chit chat, isn't so desperate to fill the silence with idle, useless noise. And Maura's thankful for it.</p><p>The work should be the only thing that matters, so long as she stands in this morgue, and the clock hasn't yet struck 6, and Korsak understands that.</p><p>It's the job that counts: the duty which has meaning.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>Korsak is either rigidly guarded or brutally honest, and it's difficult to discern which you're going to receive at any given moment.</p><p>"She likes you" He says, and the answer is clear.</p><p>Brutal honesty it is- so honest, so straightforward, in fact, that Maura has no idea what he's referring to.</p><p>"Excuse me, Detective?" Maura replies, and she smiles lopsided and lost, hands working at steeping her tea.</p><p>"I'm just saying that you're special, Doctor Isles" He looks amused, "Jane <em> likes </em> you, and I don't think I've ever seen a Medical Examiner she could stand"</p><p>"Is that so?"</p><p>"Oh yeah. She hated the last guy… Pike or whatever his name was. None of us liked him. Made the whole autopsy part of the job real hard. Used to scrap about who'd have to go down to get the report 'this time'"</p><p>Korsak hasn't quite cornered her in the breakroom, but it feels a bit like he has, mostly because he's angled his body so he's blocking the doorway: her only reasonable method of escape, she can't help but note. </p><p>Which absolutely says he's trying to stop her from fleeing… for reasons unknown.</p><p>Korsak moves to start making coffee though, as if nothing's amiss, so Maura does the same. She nods, halted, stilted, uncertain but firm. "You must mean Dr. James Pike. I've had the… pleasure of crossing paths with him. Several times before"</p><p>He cracks a grin. It's crooked. Nearly as skewed as his checkermarked tie.</p><p>"That's it!" He chortles. "...The one and only"</p><p>The laughter dies out, and when Korsak turns his gaze back on Maura, it's searing, burning with how searching it is. Maura feels much like an ant beneath a magnifying glass, with how intense his squinted gaze holds. </p><p>Burnt to a crisp by the pinpoint glare of the sun.</p><p>"Anyway, that's besides the point. Jane likes you, so you're good in my book" The smile offered is encouraging, and manages to bring her a little less off tempo. It's salve, on the freshly made burn, but not quite enough to fully ease the itching heat. </p><p>"I just thought I should let you know"</p><p>"Thank you Detective?"</p><p>He pats her on the back, once, on his way out.</p><p>Needless to say, it was a great way to close out her first week at BPD.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>"What's up with the dang parrot?"</p><p>"Hmmm?"</p><p>"You have a parrot on your elbow"</p><p>Maura glances down at her elbow, surveying the mark. It's iridescent, yellow near the beak, blue at the furthest edges of feathers. Also not a parrot. "It's a parakeet, Jane"</p><p>"Whatever. Parrot, parakeet, potato, pota-toe, toma-toe, where'd it come from?"</p><p>Maura shrugs.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>Maura can't see.</p><p>She's crying, the kind of crying that makes her chest heave, that leaves her breathless and gasping for air. She hasn't cried like this since she was small, when she'd grab fistfuls of her hair and bawl until she'd leaked dry, all snotty and puffy eyed and without shame.</p><p>They are ugly, ragged tears.</p><p>She's terrified. She's horrified that she'll never see Jane again. That that inky bay has swallowed her whole, only to offer up bones and flayed flesh in its wake. Maura hasn't seen movement in the water since Jane first broke surface tension, and now that the lingering air bubbles have dissipated, Maura just hopes she won't have to see Jane laid out on her autopsy table. Hopes she won't have to operate.</p><p>She doesn't think she'll survive it. Knows, deep down, that she can't.</p><p>She can't. She'll crumble to bits, first.</p><p>Her hands are clamped tight around the steel railing, white knuckled from the pressure, curved engravings digging into her skin. She's shaking, shaking, shaking. Moments perhaps, few and diaphanous, from plunging into that deep abyss after her.</p><p>Another hand moves to rest on the railing, before moving to cover hers, still clamped taut, aching. She feels a pressure at her side, as someone reaches to gently grasp her shoulder.</p><p>"I've got ya" They say, soothing and quiet. It takes Maura a moment to realize it's Korsak, beside her. Korsak, who attempts to pull her away. "It's gonna be okay. Officers are on their way"</p><p>She supposes she should take comfort from that, but only feels numb. Her eyes burn.</p><p>"Jane's down there" Maura swallows, but the lump in her throat won't diminish, choking as it is. "She's… I lost sight of her 8 minutes ago"</p><p>Korsak is silent, for a moment. He hasn't released Maura's shoulder yet, and gives a reassuring squeeze instead of pulling away.</p><p>"She'll pull through" He says, with a certainty Maura envies.</p><p>"I told her not to" Jump, she means. Rush to save, as she always does, with total, reckless abandon. Maura's hands tighten further against the railing, "I asked her not to. Begged her to consider, just a moment longer"</p><p>She's still glued to the side of the bridge, eyes trained on the spot where Jane plunged headfirst into the Boston Harbor.</p><p>The brush of Korsak's suit jacket against her shoulders is enough to jolt her out of it; the reverie, the plunging downward spiral, drowning as the depths dead, calm <em> silent </em> beneath them. He smiles at her, and Maura can see the concern, the worry, just behind his eyes. </p><p>Mirrored back at her. Hidden, just barely.</p><p>"Come on" He tells her, gently steering her away, and she does.</p><p>She follows, and she hurts… but she can breathe, at least.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>Korsak grins, tremulous. It's edged in anxiety, and Maura is reminded, ever so faintly, of the bridge incident.</p><p>Of awful, clawing fear.</p><p>"How's Starsky doing?" He asks, pointing at the pink box, closed on the counter. "Angela said he was feeling sick, and you had to check up on him and… I'm just worried for the little guy"</p><p>Her lab coat pocket suddenly feels as if it bears an immensely heavy weight, searing against her side. She knows if she reaches into it, she'll brush against stiff feathers, so she doesn't.</p><p>Instead, she cracks the box on the counter open, and carefully extracts the little yellow parakeet from it's depths, cradling it in her hands. She presents it to Korsak, and feels a little less anxious when she sees the way his face lights up at the sight.</p><p>"He's doing just fine," She says, patting it's head, and it twitters happily, blue tipped tail feathers fanning out in a burst of excited energy. </p><p>"Perfectly healthy"</p><p>"Look at you, Starsky" He grins wide, "Thanks for patching him up, Doc"</p><p>"Of course" And she means it.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>Most of the detectives are hardly ever caught dead not wearing a suit at work, and that means full stops, suit jackets and all. </p><p>Hardly, being the key word.</p><p>Frost frowns. "Did you get a tattoo, Korsak?"</p><p>Korsak glares at him. Then he removes his rectangular rimmed glasses, presumably so he can get a more direct view of him: better quality glaring, without obstructions in the way.</p><p>"Do I look like one of you kids, gettin' those new fangled tats?" He huffs, clearly offended. "No, my marks are enough for me"</p><p>Frost stares blankly, for a moment.</p><p>"So, you're telling me that's a soulmark on your arm… a new soulmark?"</p><p>The room quiets, ever so slightly. It's shocking news, a shocking thought. Everyone at BPD who's been around longer than a month knows it's been years, since Korsak had gotten a fresh mark.</p><p>Those came few and far between. For Korsak especially.</p><p>"Yeah, it is" He shrugs, but the weight of it, the meaning, is clear. "Nothing to gawk at. Don't you have computery things to be doing, anyway?"</p><p>Frost laughs, grinning, and it's obvious. He knows. They all know.</p><p>Korsak's affectionate glance, while cursory, is proof of it.</p><p> </p>
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